ALL SMILES – Jennifer Taylor, D.M.D., managing clinical director of just-opened Aspen Dental at Festival Mall, 1070 Iyannough Road, Hyannis, and a Barnstable High School graduate, says she is elated at being able to help usher a new and comprehensive dental care option into her home town.

Dr. Jennifer (Kenney) Taylor’s exuberance springs up like a daisy in the weeds of recession at the thought of returning to her roots to offer a new Cape option in “affordable, quality dental care.”

The perky Barnstable High School and Tufts University School of Dental Medicine graduate, delighted to be back on the Cape, she said, is lead dentist and managing clinical director of the just-opened Aspen Dental facility at 1070 Iyannough Road (Route 132) in the Festival of Hyannis plaza.

“Recognizing the challenges of the current economic environment, our goal is to make going to the dentist easier, more affordable and more convenient,” Taylor, who was raised in and has returned to live in Centerville, said during an interview this week.

“The need is there and we’re offering a wide range of cost and payment options,” she said, that include no-interest plans and working with most all insurance providers.

Besides a variety of no-interest payment plans from third-party partners, current and potential denture and bridge wearers may appreciate the new facility’s on-site fabrication lab that offers same-day service on some procedures such as relining, adjustments, repairs and select new dentures.

“We provide a full range of care,” said Taylor, whose specialty is restorative and family dentistry. Procedures include but are not limited to hygiene, oral surgery, fillings, crown and bridge work, whitening and dentures, she said.

Taylor, who co-captained the high school varsity field hockey team in 1992 to a 10-5-4 record the year before she graduated in 1993 and also was on the softball team, is a magna cum laude graduate of Northeastern University, where she majored in biology. After graduating from Tufts dental school in 2005, she was employed with Dental Associates in Quincy.

“I always wanted to come back to the Cape,” she said, a goal that was reinforced when she gave birth to a daughter 19 months ago. “When I heard Aspen was opening a site in Hyannis, I talked to a recruiter for the company and got the process started. As a mother and dentist, I appreciate the opportunity to concentrate on dentistry and not have to handle all the office and financial details.”

Returning to the Cape is also rebooting family ties and fulfilling her preference to raise her daughter on the peninsula. Her mother, Linda Alger, and two brothers, John Kenney and Richard Alger, live in Centerville, and another brother, John Alger, in Brewster. Asked if she had encountered any of her high school classmates, she replied, “Not yet ” but is optimistic, she said.

Headquartered in Syracuse, N.Y., Aspen Dental has considerable presence with 200 locations in 16 states stretching from Maine to Oregon, Arizona and Florida, logging in excess of 1.5 million patient visits in 2008 including 260,000 new patients.

As Aspen’s first office on Cape Cod and the 24th in the state, the Hyannis facility staff includes a hygienist, an on-site lab technician specializing in denture fabrication, dental assistants and office personnel. The company expects to have a staff of 10 as demand for services dictate.

The facility’s ample waiting room is festooned with a smattering of fliers explaining payment plans and wall-mounted marketing posters. For example, one touts the advantages of Aspen as authorized provider of full and partial, hand-crafted ComfiDents brand dentures.

The company is offering new patients free exams, special pricing on x-rays for new patients without insurance, and senior discounts.